Thich Nhat Hanh
Short biography based on wikipedia 2006
Thich
Nhat Hanh (Thích Nhất Hạnh) is an expatriate Vietnamese Zen Buddhist
monk. A teacher, author, and peace activist, Nhat Hanh was born in
central Vietnam on October 11, 1926. He joined a Zen monastery at the
age of 16, studied Buddhism as a novice, and was fully ordained as a
monk in 1949. The title Thích is used by all Vietnamese monks and nuns,
meaning that they are part of the Shakya (Shakyamuni Buddha) clan. He
coined the term Engaged Buddhism in his book Vietnam: Lotus in a Sea of
Fire.
In the early 1960's, he founded the School of Youth for
Social Services (SYSS) in Saigon, a grass roots relief organization
that rebuilt bombed villages, set up schools and medical centers, and
resettled families left homeless during the Vietnam War. He traveled to
the U.S. a number of times to study and later teach at Columbia
University, and to promote the cause of peace. He urged Martin Luther
King, Jr. to oppose the Vietnam War publicly, and spoke with many
people and groups about peace. In 1967, King nominated him for the
Nobel Peace Prize. Nhat Hanh led the Buddhist delegation to the Paris
Peace Talks. One of the best known Buddhist teachers in the West, Thich
Nhat Hanh's teachings and practices appeal to people from various
religious, spiritual, and political backgrounds. He offers a practice
of mindfulness that is often adapted to Western sensibilities.
He
created the Order of Interbeing in 1966, and established monastic and
practice centers around the world. His home is Plum Village Monastery
in the Dordogne region in the South of France. He travels
internationally giving retreats and talks. Exiled from Vietnam for many
years, he was allowed to return for a trip in 2005. He has published
more than 100 books, including more than 40 in English. He also
publishes a quarterly Dharma talk in the journal of the Order of
Interbeing, the Mindfulness Bell. Nhat Hanh continues to be active in
the peace movement. He has sponsored retreats for Israelis and
Palestinians, encouraging them to listen and learn about each other;
given speeches urging warring countries to stop fighting and look for
non-violent solutions to problems; and conducted a peace walk in Los
Angeles in 2005 attended by thousands of people.
Biography
Thich
Nhat Hanh was born Nguyễn Xuân Bảo in Thừa Thiên (Central Vietnam) in
1926. At the age of 16 he entered the monastery at Từ Hiếu Temple near
Huế, Vietnam, where his primary teacher was Dhyana (meditation; Zen)
Master Thanh Quý Chân Thật. A graduate of Bao Quoc Buddhist Academy in
Central Vietnam,[2] Thich Nhat Hanh received training in Zen (in
Vietnamese: Thiền) and the Mahayana school of Buddhism and was ordained
as a monk in 1949. Thich Nhat Hanh is now recognized as a Dharmacharya
and as the spiritual head of the Từ Hiếu Temple and associated
monasteries. He is the Elder of the Từ Hiếu branch of the 8th
generation of the Liễu Quán lineage in the 42nd generation of the Lâm
Tế Dhyana school (Lin Chi Chan in Chinese or Rinzai Zen
in Japanese). On May 1st, 1966 at Từ Hiếu Temple, Thich Nhat Hanh
received the “lamp transmission”, making him a Dharmacharya or Dharma
Teacher, from Master Chân Thật. Thich Nhat Hanh has combined his deep
knowledge of a variety of traditional Zen teaching methods with methods
from Theravada Buddhism and ideas from Western psychology to form his
approach to modern Zen practice. Thich Nhat Hanh has become an
important influence in the development of Western Buddhism.
In
1956 he was named Editor-in-Chief of Vietnamese Buddhism, the
periodical of the Unified Vietnam Buddhist Association (Giáo Hội Phật
Giáo Việt Nam Thống Nhất). In the following years he founded Lá Bối
Press, the Van Hanh Buddhist University in Saigon, and the School of
Youth for Social Service (SYSS), a corps of Buddhist peaceworkers who
went into rural areas to establish schools, build healthcare clinics,
and help re-build villages.
During the Vietnam War
Van
Hanh Buddhist University became a prestigious private university that
focused on Buddhist studies, Vietnamese culture, and languages. Nhat
Hanh taught Buddhist psychology and Prajnaparamita literature. At a
meeting in April 1965, Van Hanh Union students issued a Call for Peace
statement. Its main theme was: "It is time for North and South Vietnam
to find a way to stop the war and help all Vietnamese people live
peacefully and with mutual respect." When Thich Nhat Hanh left for the
U.S. shortly afterwards, control over Van Hanh University was taken
over by one of the Chancellors who wished to sever ties with Thich Nhat
Hanh and the SYSS, calling Sister Chan Khong, who was left in control
of the organization, a "communist". From that point, the SYSS struggled
to raise funds and endured a number of attacks on its members, many of
whom were threatened, harassed, and murdered. The SYSS persisted in
their efforts, refusing to take sides in the conflict and continuing to
provide aid to people in need.
Thich Nhat Hanh has been a leader
in the Engaged Buddhism movement and he is credited with bringing the
idea to the West. He credits the thirteenth-century Vietnamese King
Tran Nhan Tong with the origination of the concept. Tran Nhan Tong
abdicated his throne to become a monk, and founded the still dominant
Vietnamese Buddhist school, the Bamboo Forest tradition.
In
1960, Thich Nhat Hanh came to the U.S. to study comparative religion at
Princeton University, and he was subsequently appointed lecturer in
Buddhism at Columbia University. By then, he had gained fluency in
French, Chinese, Sanskrit, Pali, Japanese, and English, in addition to
his native Vietnamese. In 1963 he returned to Vietnam to aid his fellow
monks in their non-violent peace efforts.
Thich Nhat Hanh
returned to the US in 1966 to lead a symposium in Vietnamese Buddhism
at Cornell University and to continue his work for peace. Thich Nhat
Hanh had written a letter to Martin Luther King, Jr. in 1965 entitled:
“Searching for the Enemy of Man” and it was during his 1966 stay in the
U.S. that Thich Nhat Hanh met with Martin Luther King, Jr. and urged
him to publicly denounce the Vietnam War.
Dr. King gave his
famous speech at the Riverside Church in New York City in 1967, his
first to publicly question the U.S. involvement in Vietnam. Later that
year, Dr. King nominated Thich Nhat Hanh for the 1967 Nobel Peace
Prize. In his nomination Rev. King said, "I do not personally know of
anyone more worthy of [this prize] than this gentle monk from Vietnam.
His ideas for peace, if applied, would build a monument to ecumenism,
to world brotherhood, to humanity." (Despite King's high praise, the
committee decided not to make an award that year. King's revelation of
his nomination was a violation of tradition and the explicit "strong
request" of the prize committee.)
In 1969, Thich Nhat Hanh was
the delegate for the Buddhist Peace Delegation at the Paris Peace
talks. When the Paris Peace Accords were signed in 1973, the Vietnamese
government denied Thich Nhat Hanh permission to return to Vietnam, and
he went into exile in France. From 1976 through 1977, he led efforts to
help rescue Vietnamese boat people in the Gulf of Siam, but was forced
to stop because of the hostility of the governments of Thailand and
Singapore. In 1969, Thich Nhat Hanh established the Unified Buddhist
Church (Église Bouddhique Unifiée) in France (not a part of the Unified
Buddhist Church of Vietnam).
Establishing the Order of Interbeing
In
1975, he formed the Sweet Potatoes Meditation Center. The center grew
and in 1982 he and his colleague Sister Chân Không founded Plum Village
Buddhist Center (Làng Mai), a monastery and Practice Center in the
Dordogne in the south of France.[3] Since the mid 60s he heads a
monastic and lay group, the Order of Inter-Being, teaching the Five and
Fourteen Mindfulness Trainings and "Engaged Buddhism." The Unified
Buddhist Church is the legally recognized governance body for Plum
Village (Làng Mai) in France; for Maple Forest Monastery and Green
Mountain Dharma Center in Vermont, the Community of Mindful Living,
Parallax Press, Deer Park Monastery in California, and Magnolia Village
in Mississippi.
There are now two monasteries in Vietnam, at the
original Từ Hiếu Temple near Huế and at Prajna Temple in the central
highlands. Thich Nhat Hanh and the Order of Interbeing have established
monasteries and Dharma centers in the United States at Deer Park
Monastery (Tu Viện Lộc Uyển) in Escondido, California, Maple Forest
Monastery (Tu Viện Rừng Phong) and Green Mountain Dharma Center (Ðạo
Tràng Thanh Sơn) both in Vermont, and Magnolia Village Practice Center
(Đạo Tràng Mộc Lan) in Mississippi. These monasteries are open to the
public during much of the year and provide on-going retreats for lay
people. The Order of Interbeing also holds focused retreats for groups
of lay people, such as families, teenagers, veterans, the entertainment
industry, members of Congress, law enforcement officers, people of
color, and professional and scientific interest groups.
Return to Vietnam
From
January 12 until April 11, 2005, Thich Nhat Hanh returned to Vietnam
after a series of negotiations that allowed him to teach, have select
titles of his books published in Vietnamese, and allowed 100 monastic
and 90 lay members of his Order to accompany him in his travels around
the country, including a return to his root temple, Tu Hieu Temple in
Hue.
Prior to the 2005 trip, Thich Nhat Hanh’s organization had
been highly critical of the restrictions imposed by the Vietnamese
government regarding a possible visit. Those restrictions included: not
allowing his monastics to stay in Buddhist monastaries, not allowing
him to teach to large crowds as he does in the West, and not allowing
his books to be published in Vietnamese.
The trip was not
without controversy. Thich Vien Dinh writing on behalf of the Unified
Buddhist Church of Vietnam (considered illegal by the Vietnamese
government) called for Thich Nhat Hanh to make a statement against the
Vietnam government’s poor record on religious freedom. Thich Vien Dinh
feared that the trip would be used as propaganda by the Vietnamese
government, making the world believe that the issues of religious
freedom are improving there, while abuses continue.